Google Alert - inspiration thoughts
Saturday, April 3, 2010
Google Blogs Alert for: inspiration thoughts
| Explore Life - Journal - Inspirational Podcasts, Open To Guidance ... By Joseph Bernard First is that I have discovered a really great source for inspiration - podcasts. Yes I know they have been around but with my new i-Pod shuffle I can now download the most amazing and inspirational thoughts and ideas. ... Journal - http://www.explorelifeblog.com/ |
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Dr. Robert Montgomery, chief transplant surgeon at Johns Hopkins Hospital, said that doctors at four hospitals in four states transplanted eight kidneys over three weeks in what he called the largest chain of donations in history. He believes such intricate, multi-state exchanges can drastically reduce the number of patients waiting for eligible donors. Multiple-kidney transplants occur when several people who need transplants have friends or relatives who are willing to donate kidneys but aren't compatible. A chain of surgeries is arranged in which each donor is matched with a transplant candidate who they don't know but is compatible with their kidney. The transplant chains also involve altruistic donors who are located through a database and give kidneys to anyone. Recipients and donors were equally delighted to be part of this unique procedure. [ 
Last fall, before Thanksgiving, I was making my way in my car out of the shopping center parking lot. I was all alone in the car. I noticed a woman laden with bags and her two boys, one carrying a pumpkin and the other another bag. On a random impulse, I rolled down my window and asked "Would you like a ride?" "Oh yes!" was their excited reaction. This was special for me because, as a handicapped person, I'm often on the receiving end of help and now I know how good it feels to be useful. [ 
"Things the recession has taught me: keeping your thermostat at 63 degrees in the winter and at 85 in the summer is uncomfortable but not fatal. Lesson two? You are not using your library enough. Do you know you can take out as many books as you want? And that they have free storytimes and craft lessons for kids? And that you can check out DVDs? Thankfully, my community has well-funded, thriving libraries. And parks. Parks are free. Another lesson: you can eat cheaply without resorting to Top Ramen. You don't *need* meat. Beans and grains will take you far." From an account of a family that is forced to share due to the recession, and subsequently learned how much they received in return. [ 
Not many balding, middle-aged Bolivian immigrants have feature-length films produced about them. But then again, not many people have a heart attack, get a gallbladder removed, and spring back to school the next day to teach math. Jaime Escalante, subject of the 1988 film 'Stand and Deliver,' was a passionate teacher, father-figure, and "street-gang equal" who passed away at the age of 79 on Tuesday. A teacher who explained math concepts using wind-up toys and space-alien dolls, and who drilled his students before school, after school, and on Saturdays, Escalante built one of the most successful Advanced Placement programs in the nation, in a low-income high school that had been struggling to keep its accreditation. "If Kimo can do it, we can do it," one student remarks. "If he wants to teach us that bad." [ 
Raj Kaliya Dhanuk sits on a wooden bench, barefoot, with a tattered sari covering thin arms as rough as bark. Thick clear tears bleed from her eyes, milky saucers that stare at nothing. Dhanuk and more than 500 others - most of whom have never seen a doctor before - have traveled for days by bicycle, motorbike, bus and even on their relatives' backs to reach Dr. Sanduk Ruit's mobile eye camp. Each hopes for the miracle promised in radio ads by the Nepalese master surgeon: He is able to perform cataract surgery, without stitches, in about five minutes. Free of charge. [ 
With a rising awareness of religious-based conflict and violence around the world, interfaith dialogue and education is more important than ever. As a college student committed to issues of social justice, Eboo Patel noticed that religion was often left out of diversity discussions. After discovering the ways Dorothy Day used her Catholicism to inspire her social justice work, Patel began exploring his own Muslim faith as a foundation for social change. Now, he is the founder of the Interfaith Youth Core (IFYC), a rapidly growing organization that serves to empower young people through interfaith awareness and engagement. Since its inception a decade ago, IFYC has worked with about 60 college campuses, sponsored 50 interfaith fellows, and hosted its sixth interfaith youth conference! [ 
The principal of Bellingham Christian School canceled classes at the private school today because it's too nice out. "Good morning students, parents and staff. Yes, It's a Sun Day! Wahooo," Sampson wrote on a page on the school's Web site. The page also features a picture of him giving a thumbs-up from the seat of his year-old Suzuki 450 motorcycle. "That's right, school is CANCELLED today due to good weather! Enjoy!" 
After Kenya's disputed election in 2007, violence erupted. A prominent Kenyan lawyer and blogger, Ory Okolloh, who was based in South Africa but had gone back to Kenya to vote and observe the election, received threats about her work and returned to South Africa. She posted online the idea of an Internet mapping tool to allow people anonymously to report violence and other misdeeds. Technology whizzes saw her post and built the Ushahidi Web platform over a long weekend. The site collected user-generated cellphone reports of riots, stranded refugees, rapes and deaths and plotted them on a map, using the locations given by informants. It collected more testimony -- which is what ushahidi means in Swahili -- with greater rapidity than any reporter or election monitor. 
For Doug Burgess, weeds are constant companions. As a kid, Doug was given the task of removing weeds from the front lawn, but his task extended through his teen-age years and beyond. "As a middling bureaucrat," he writes, "I often pulled weeds as a form of therapy." He adds that after more than a half-century of weeding, he still did not have a single weed-free patch to show for his efforts. Finally, Doug -- as he put it -- "went over to the dark side" by moving to a neighborhood where no one worries about weeds. Now he names the weeds he finds in his yard and follows their life-cycle. And he photographs them. Meet an artist named Doug Burgess. 
He teaches them to be grateful and he wants them to meditate. But Prof. Srikumar Rao's isn't a spiritual teacher: he teaches at some of the world's top business schools! In his gentle voice, he asks his students to stop living in a "me centered" world and start living in an "other centered" one. At a conference in Copenhagen, he spoke of breaking free of the "I'd be happy if ..." mental model, and embrace our hard-wired happiness. 
Most of us would dig deep in our pockets to donate to a good cause, but how many of us would sacrifice everything? Wealthy businessman Jon Pedley is about to do just that. The 41 year-old is selling his comfortable home, successful consulting business, and top-of-the-line car to kick-off a service-immersion program in rural Uganda. The hope is to improve the community's health, water, and education facilities while giving troubled teens and young adults the opportunity to serve. Read on to learn about the transformation and dreams of a recovering alcoholic who previously described his life as "totally and utterly self-centered". 
"I'm a simple person," says a man who goes by the name Tree. "We're going to grow food here, and then we're going to give it away to people who need it." On a 1/3 acre lot in San Francisco, known unofficially as the Free Farm, volunteers cultivate the land and its given freely to anyone who wants it. Since 2008, Tree has donated more than 6,000 pounds of food on Sunday mornings. 
Sociologists have developed elaborate theories of who spreads gossip and news, but they've had less success measuring what kind of information travels fastest. More recently, though, researchers at Penn dived deep into the archives of NY Times articles and found a surprising result -- good news travels faster than bad. "If I've just read this story that changes the way I understand the world and myself, I want to talk to others about what it means," Dr. Jonah Berger said. 
